


if you love me any, let me know it now

by mallowstep (actualmuseofspace)



Series: Cloudtail's Daughter [1]
Category: Warriors - Erin Hunter
Genre: (AFFECTIONATE), Book Series: The New Prophecy, Breaking the Warrior Code (Warriors), Canon Compliant, Character Study, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/F, Fluff, Hollyleaf/Willowshine - Freeform, Homophobia, Literal Sleeping Together, Medicine Cats (Warriors), Overuse of italics, Pining, Unrequited Love, Useless Lesbians, it's ambigious but not my intention, it's very background so i'm not tagging it in the relationships line, no beta we die like men, not really but it could be interpretted as such, so much pining, timeline fudging
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-28 21:35:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30145938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/actualmuseofspace/pseuds/mallowstep
Summary: Leafpaw doesn't need someone to tell her her trouble will never be with toms. (Although in retrospect, perhaps someone should have.) The sky is blue, leaf-bare is cold, and for the rest of her life, Mothwing will be the most beautiful thing she sees.(Standalone.)
Relationships: Crowfeather/Leafpool (Warriors), Leafpool/Mothwing (Warriors), One Sided - Relationship
Series: Cloudtail's Daughter [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2218794
Comments: 3
Kudos: 9





	if you love me any, let me know it now

**Author's Note:**

> so this is. not beta'd. my cat was sleeping, i wrote it, she left, i finished it, et voila, i post.

Leafpaw met Mothwing during green-leaf.

Mothwing was something Leafpaw hadn't known before, something strong and warm and _beautiful._ She wanted Mothwing to be an apprentice with her; she wanted to see her again. There was a _demanding_ in her, something begging to see her. Leafpaw agreed to be introduced.

She didn't tell Mothwing everything. She didn't say, "I'll pray for you." She didn't say, "I'm sure there will be a sign." Mostly, she didn't say, "I saw your face and I couldn't look away," but above all else, that was on her mind.

Mothwing came to the next half-moon meeting, and Leafpaw had to fight to keep it from tumbling out of her all over again. Maybe she failed, because Mothwing seemed to rebuke her, gentle as it may be. Leafpaw knew she failed in keeping the disappointment off her face. She could see an unfamiliar expression on Cinderpelt's face, amusement crossed with frustration. It was similar to the look she made when she was convincing a warrior to rest another day, or a kit to take their herbs.

As they walked, Mothwing seemed to warm to her. She couldn't help the way she almost preened under the attention, the way she tried to soak in every ounce of conversation that passed between them. Leafpaw could sympathize with Mothwing's nervousness. The fear that she had felt was still fresh and familiar, and Leafpaw was clan-borne.

There was something almost contagious about Mothwing, about the way she made the journey to the Mothermouth feel like an adventure. Leafpaw wanted to lounge in the sun, wanted to stretch out her excuses of exhaustion just to keep talking. She watched the light pass through Mothwing's fur and a low purr rumbled in her, friendly and comforting. She wanted Mothwing to savor this moment as much as she did, wanted Mothwing's eyes to stay on her.

It took two days for her to name the feeling.

(Sorreltail was the first time she felt this, her heart pounding every time the apprentice agreed to go somewhere with her. She couldn't explain the taste it left in the mouth or the way her chest felt twisted up over it. Cinderpelt explained _mates_ to her, but she didn't explain _love_ and _partnership_. Leafpaw had to figure that part out for herself.)

Not that it mattered how she felt, or whether she could name it. Leafpaw couldn't stop feeling, couldn't control the situation, couldn't stop her traitorous heart. Mothwing was a clan away, anyway, so what did it matter if she asked after her? Medicine cats often formed close bonds with each other. That was all Leafpaw wanted, at any rate. She could hardly ask for more.

* * *

When Squirrelpaw left, Leafpaw tried hard not to feel hurt. Squirrelpaw wasn't _leaving_ her, after all, she was on a StarClan-granted quest. Leafpaw even got to say goodbye, had the security of knowing that Squirrelpaw was okay, wherever she was. She tried not to focus on her sister's absence. She talked to Sorreltail, her friend a newly-minted warrior, thought about Mothwing, listened to Cinderpelt, and mostly, tried not to let the guilt at hiding her sister's location destroy her.

Mothwing continued to be a desirable distraction. She had more energy than Leafpaw usually did, but it was tempered, by age or experience. When Reedpaw fell into the river, Leafpaw comforted Mothwing, and suddenly, Mothwing wasn't a desirable distraction. Now, she was another sort of guilt. It was one thing to _harbor_ feelings, and another thing entirely to act on them.

But even more than the code, Leafpaw knew she was taking advantage of Mothwing. She was exploiting her distress, when she was supposed to be comforting like any good friend.

Instead, Leafpaw leaned on Sorreltail. She seemed _safer,_ somehow. If Leafpaw ever felt this way for her, it had long been washed away by Mothwing, and Sorreltail couldn't be lead on in the same way. Leafpaw couldn't cause Sorreltail to break the code and lose the position she had already struggled so much for. It helped that Sorreltail was already a good friend, and Leafpaw didn't need a reason to want to spend more time with her.

(If Cinderpelt's emotions were harder for Leafpaw to read, she only brushed it off. Cinderpelt's mix of amusement and fear were easily explainable by innumerable other antics and concerns. Her anxiety could easily be caused by the general situation they were muddling through. Leafpaw didn't want to think about the secrets she was keeping, and she didn't want to think about the other reason Cinderpelt would wear a fragile, fearful posture when she thought Leafpaw couldn't see, so it was easier to not worry about what Cinderpelt might have been hiding under the surface.)

It seemed a cruel twist of fate that _Sorreltail_ would be trapped with her. That there was no cat she cared for that she wouldn't inevitably harm.

* * *

She avoided Mothwing for a while after that. There was much more going on, at any rate, and Leafpaw didn't need to make excuses to want to reunite with Squirrelpaw and meet the cats her sister had spent so long with. Crowpaw was entirely accidental.

He had an angry hurt to him, one Leafpaw understood. (One Leafpaw could feel growing in her.) He was quiet, and she didn't have to be anything around him.

She really didn't mean it all to fall the way it did. He was still grieving, she thought, that's why he asked to be named Crowfeather to begin with. But because anyone who loved Leafpaw was cursed, she hurt him too.

That's what she told herself as she avoided Mothwing. Or rather, as she _tried_ to avoid Mothwing. She was magnetic, brilliant, _beautiful,_ and Leafpaw could never really stay away. Leafpaw should feel guilty, because it was entirely her fault that the WindClan elders were sick. It was entirely her fault that she was too enamored by Mothwing to risk hurting her. It was entirely her fault that, sooner or later, she was going to be another reason that medicine cats don't have mates.

Mothwing's disbelief in StarClan felt like _relief._ It was something she could anchor herself in every time she thought of Mothwing with more _want_ than appropriate, something she could use to cover the guilt and grief she felt as she tried to step away. It wasn't particularly effective at either, but at least it gave the illusion of accomplishing both.

* * *

Leafpool couldn't help but find it ironic that it was _Crowfeather_ whose name would be whispered with hers, as they taught new apprentices how they must not fall in love. Crowfeather, who she had never loved, who she never meant to let love _her,_ and now these kits would forever hide that.

When they left, she meant to ask Mothwing to come with her. She convinced herself she would go back for her. Once the kits were safe, she would slink back into Clan territory just long enough to ask Mothwing to leave. She knew she never would, but she thought it would be because she couldn't bear to hear Mothwing say no, not because Crowfeather was going back with her.

After her kits were born, she gave up. She couldn't stop loving Mothwing. There was no Cinderpelt to give Leafpool a pitying, painful expression every time her tail twitched just because someone said Mothwing. There was no Sorreltail, not the way there had been. Squirrelflight was raising kits, too, and Squirrelflight's problems always seemed to be about how toms she didn't love kept confessing to her. Leafpool was entirely the other way around.

Willowpaw became more like her daughter than Hollykit, Jaykit, and Lionkit. She loved her sister's kits, but she shared Willowpaw with Mothwing. Willowpaw herself was wonderful, and it didn't hurt that she provided plausible deniability for Leafpool to bunt her head against Mothwing. The _want_ in her felt obvious, but no one but Mothwing said anything.

Mothwing, who made Leafpool feel like a fool, in the best way possible, because she should have left with her to begin with. If Leafpool had asked, Mothwing would have come.

* * *

Leafpool let this be enough. She had no choice: This was all she could have. She relished every moment they spent together, every stolen second at RiverClan's camp, every half moon meeting when Mothwing made sure she sat next to Leafpool, because when they woke, Leafpool would, without fail, be curled into Mothwing. Leafpool presented Hollypaw and Jaypaw in turn to her, and Mothwing treated them with a kindness that could have been for her own kits.

(Hollypaw, her mother's daughter, was practically enamored with Willowpaw. Jaypaw, his mother's son, rejected any affection that came so easily. It didn't surprise Leafpool that Jaypaw was the one she had to explain to Mothwing, even though she liked to think he inherited far more of her appearance than Hollypaw.)

Of course, it never _was_ enough, but she had learned by now not to ask for more. Leafpool had learned that trying to love more than she could would only lead to more hurt. Mothwing loved her back, and they took every possible moment they could to share this, and it wasn't enough, because how could it possibly be _enough_ , but it wasn't nothing, and for a long time, that's all Leafpool thought she could get.

In a way, she was glad she died. Not because she was any more ready to die than any other healthy cat her age, but because at least now, she had a _chance._ Because Leafpool was _cursed,_ apparently in a way that even death couldn't free her from, she was denied her ability to talk to Mothwing, but it didn't last forever.

It was easier than she thought to convince Mothwing. She was already on the fence, years of exposure and the entirety of the Great Battle weakening her beliefs. But Leafpool thought it helped that she got to tell Mothwing when the time came, Leafpool's nest was big enough for two.

**Author's Note:**

> lots of timeline fudging for this one.
> 
> also, please don't mind the series, it's not going to be touched for a while.


End file.
